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[Events] Amigbg 2004 quick reportANN.lu
Posted on 03-Apr-2004 13:30 GMT by Morgan Johansson92 comments
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Here is the first(?) report from Amigbg2004 held in Gothenburg. You can find a small report of the event here: http://hem.passagen.se/anescgfx/ , even some lo-res photos if you're interested. :)
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 1 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 03-Apr-2004 17:56 GMT
I listened to the broadcast, and I think the most interesting announcement was of the new Knoppix-based Amiga Forever. This sounds like a product that would be worth buying even if you already have an AmigaOne or a Pegasos.

Cloanto will be putting the details on their website some time next week.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 2 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 03-Apr-2004 18:42 GMT
In reply to Comment 1 (Don Cox):
Yes, the same I felt, too. It could be a
successor to Amithlon and Umilator :)
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 3 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Metalheart on 03-Apr-2004 18:48 GMT
In reply to Comment 1 (Don Cox):
What's a knoppix based amiga forever ?

What did they say about this ?

Thanks,

Martin
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 4 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 03-Apr-2004 19:02 GMT
In reply to Comment 3 (Metalheart):
Knoppix is a version of Linux which can be run entirely from the CD, without touching the PC's hard drive - what is called a "Live CD".

With Amiga Forever replacing the Linux OS you will have a CD that you can pop into any PC that has its BIOS set for booting from CD, reboot, and it is an Amiga. Quite like Amithlon but probably recognising more hardware - Knoppix is very good at this.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 5 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 03-Apr-2004 19:07 GMT
The other interesting announcement was that the AOS4 pre-release CD will come with a serial number on the packaging. Don't lose it because it will give access to a web site from which updates and demos can be downloaded.

There will be an archive of the AOS4 SDK on the CD. (I think that was already known.)
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 6 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Johan Rönnblom on 03-Apr-2004 21:46 GMT
Some other bits and pieces:

Ben Hermans said they hope/plan to release developer version of OS4 at
the end of next week.

Alan Redhouse didn't want to give any release date for the MicroA1,
but from the length of his little speech when he got the question it
seems clear they still have a bit of work before it's ready.

Redhouse also avoided to answer a question about the number of sold
A1's by talking about the Pegasos. He said that the number of sold
A1's was "higher than their low estimate of Pegasos sales, but lower
than their high estimate". Hmm. I would have preferred just a number..

Also, he talked about some kind of performance problem with the
Pegasos1 (no, nobody ever asked him about it, don't know why he
talked about it so much). When I asked him to specify what he was
talking about, he said he didn't know but he had heard about it from
someone who did. Right.

There was a salesperson from IBM there who gave a nice presentation
about the PowerPC. Not much new information perhaps, but an enjoyable
presentation nevertheless. Very professional.

Jens Schönfeldt definitely won the geek deluxe awards with his
presentation about the C64 ethernet card and the new Catweasel MK4.
I'm personally totally uninterested in floppy drive technology but I
respect people going all the way. Sadly there was a rather heated
argument afterwards when someone asked why Jens totally refused to
support the Pegasos or MorphOS and Jens accused Genesi of everything
from maliciously lowering the Peg1 price just after he bought one, to
somehow aiding the shoebomber (!). I don't know if some of his claims
were valid, but perhaps it would have been enough to say he didn't
like Genesi and leave it at that.

I suppose attendance figures will become public, but the figure I
heard was 250+ people, which is definitely better than last year.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 7 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 03-Apr-2004 23:56 GMT
> Quite like Amithlon but probably recognising more hardware - Knoppix is very good at this.

I think what separates Amithlon from UAE is that it allows Amiga code to interface with x86 code, through a special version of gcc (just what I heard, I don't have Amithlon). This product sounds more like plain UAE for Linux. Not so exiting if you take into account that the Windows UAE version is updated much more often and faster, courtesy of DirectX.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 8 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 00:09 GMT
In reply to Comment 6 (Johan Rönnblom):
> When I asked him to specify what he was talking about, he said he didn't know but he had heard about it from someone who did. Right.

Actually, he was a bit more specific and said something along the lines of "no concurrent operation" due to April. I have no clue though what that might mean. DMA is integrated into the memory bus protocol by taking some cycles away from the CPU, regardless of mainboard, northbridge or CPU: DMA never runs "concurrently", on any system, it's either CPU or DMA. SD-RAM just is not dual-ported RAM. I don't know if I misunderstood due to bad audio quality but some other technical statements by Alan were equally confused/confusing. For example, he alternately described the April as "dongle" and "fix" and, in the context of DMA problems under Linux blamed endianess?! But again, I might just have misunderstood, the audio quality of that part made it difficult for me to understand him.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 9 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Seehund on 04-Apr-2004 02:27 GMT
In reply to Comment 8 (Anonymous):
> But again, I might just have misunderstood, the audio quality of that part made
> it difficult for me to understand him.

I don't think you misheard him. Dunno if there are recordings available for download yet, but I was there (for what that's worth; Alan spoke to us from the UK(?) over a mobile phone), and he actually said these things. BTW, as usual it was he who kept insisting on bringing up things like Pegasoses.

I asked if he knew any details about the upcoming Teron I (Articia I + PPC970) and whether he had any plans on selling that. I don't know if it was the word "Teron", but apparently some inner defence mechanism was triggered and made him wander off on some weird diatribe, then the sound disappeared.

For whatever shows that are coming up, I think it'd be more worthwhile to call up or invite someone who is more familiar with the products and prepared to answer questions from a technically minded audience, like e.g. Bill Mueller or somebody else at Mai.

Some other thoughts on the show, in addition to what others have said...

I couldn't come there until in the afternoon, so I unfortunately missed the AROS and Cloanto presentations, which seem to have been especially interesting.

I got the opportunity to compare AOS4ß with and without PPC native graphics.library, and it was like night and day! There's still much room for improvement though. Unfortunately the specific demo machine (a Teron PX G3 IIRC) that the PPC version was running on kept freezing due to (?) a disk validation error, so I spent the most time on the one with the older beta (a G4 box).

I got to see MorphOS "live" for the first time as well. Extremely fast GUI, dir listings et c., snappier than any "consumer desktop" I've seen, and like AOS4ß it looks quite mature at a first glance like this.

In between the more blatant marketing (both the verbal one and the one in the shape of free trinkets being showered upon us ;)) the IBM presentation was an interesting and entertaining summary of all available info about the past, present and future of POWER and PowerPC. Hey IBM, I'm gonna sue you black and blue for trademark infringement if I don't get a free "Sony Hackman"! ;)

I thought the Eyetech session was pointless and confusing, so enough about that.

Hyperion was represented by Ben Hermans, but he started out by saying he no longer has anything to do with e.g. AOS4 but mainly helps out with legal matters. Hans-Jörg (or was it Thomas?) Frieden is now managing the AOS4 project. Otherwise, nothing much new.

Jens Schönfeld obviously has got something very cool with his Catweasel IV, although I would personally have preferred that some of the time spent on archane disk drive technical minutiae was spent on a product demo. Unfortunately some of the good impression was spoilt by an embarrassingly childish reply to a question about OS support from the audience at the end.
The C=64 web browsing/serving demo was awesome. All good things come to those who waaaaaaaaaait. ;)

The show (the exhibitor stands) in general was like I assume most Amiga shows are these days, something of a bake sale. I suppose this is simply the way things are, but especially when everything seems to be centered around selling one thing that's not yet available, and when it is it can only be sold to those already in "the club" (no pun intended). Everything was extremely well organised, and the show management gave a very professional impression overall.

All in all, I could have spent $20/€16 in an afternoon on much unhealthier things! Well, I did, but unrelated to the show, that's why I'm typing this incoherent post at 6 in the morning... Came home with some loot as well; the latest 2XM CD (quite good) plus their AmiGBG Anthem (good music + scaringly fanatical chant about Teron mobos; "There can be only One" et c. - *shudder*), as well as some IBM and ATI freebies.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 10 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by smithy on 04-Apr-2004 05:41 GMT
Was KMOS at the show?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 11 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Lando on 04-Apr-2004 08:40 GMT
In reply to Comment 6 (Johan Rönnblom):
>Redhouse also avoided to answer a question about the number of sold
>A1's by talking about the Pegasos. He said that the number of sold
>A1's was "higher than their low estimate of Pegasos sales, but lower
>than their high estimate". Hmm. I would have preferred just a number..

He said ~1000 sold at the last UK show, iirc.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 12 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Metalheart on 04-Apr-2004 08:59 GMT
In reply to Comment 4 (Don Cox):
I see, could be interesting.....
Maybe a revival of Amiga OS x86 :)
Altough it still would end at 3.9.

What about intergrating Amiga Forever in OS4, was that misunderstood ?

Thanks,

Martin
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 13 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by koan on 04-Apr-2004 09:21 GMT
I don't quite follow the situation with the SDK:

a. Pre-release AOS4 has an SDK -> no SDK in consumer release
b. SDK to be released as separate CD

Is this right ?

Are there any software developer tools planned to be part of consumer AOS4 release ?
Will we be able to download the SDK (for free ?!)

Or is it all too early to say ?

cheers

koan
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 14 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Sammy Nordström on 04-Apr-2004 09:58 GMT
In reply to Comment 9 (Seehund):
You provoced Alan, like so many times before, and didn't get the answer you were looking for. Big surprise.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 15 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Sammy Nordström on 04-Apr-2004 10:10 GMT
In reply to Comment 6 (Johan Rönnblom):
>Ben Hermans said they hope/plan to release developer version of OS4 at
>the end of next week.

It should be noted that this was the expected timeframe for the AmigaOS4 Beta master CD, not when the AmigaOne Earlybird owners will actually have the master CD in their mailbox. To be realistic, add atleast another two weeks or so for distribution, etc.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 16 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Sammy Nordström on 04-Apr-2004 10:27 GMT
In reply to Comment 15 (Sammy Nordström):
Doh! Of course they will not distribute the master CD. That should have stated *copies* of the master CD. :-P
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 17 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 11:03 GMT
In reply to Comment 9 (Seehund):
"For whatever shows that are coming up, I think it'd be more worthwhile to call up or invite someone who is more familiar with the products and prepared to answer questions from a technically minded audience, like e.g. Bill Mueller or somebody else at Mai."

Somebody from MAI could do a presentation on the chip designs (although most of the info is on their web site), but the design of the boards is contracted out. You would have to find out who is actually doing the board design. My impression is that MAI commission a basic reference board and Eyetech then commission the design of practical commercial versions.

MAI's business is fabless chip design. The boards are only provided as a reference for developers.

I think whether a talk by a board designer was worth while would depend on how good he was at public speaking. The standard of presentation in the Amiga community is quite high.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 18 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 11:06 GMT
In reply to Comment 10 (smithy):
"Was KMOS at the show?"

Garry Hare said in the interview that he would not be going to Amiga shows. He is simply not interested in the desktop Amiga market.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 19 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 11:20 GMT
In reply to Comment 6 (Johan Rönnblom):
OS4 at the end of next week? Wow, that's only another two weeks from now! :)
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 20 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 11:23 GMT
In reply to Comment 9 (Seehund):
I think it's good that Ben Hermans is out of the picture. His blatant
lies, trolling and FUD spreading in forums became a burdon to the
project. The Friedens seems more sensible in this way.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 21 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 11:29 GMT
In reply to Comment 18 (Don Cox):
"He is simply not interested in the desktop Amiga market"

What a bummer! Perhaps he should have bought "Amiga DE" instead?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 22 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 11:29 GMT
In reply to Comment 18 (Don Cox):
"He is simply not interested in the desktop Amiga market"

What a bummer! Perhaps he should have bought "Amiga DE" instead?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 23 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Seehund on 04-Apr-2004 11:52 GMT
In reply to Comment 17 (Don Cox):
Mai haven't commissioned or outsourced the design of any of the currently available boards, they're designed in-house, mainly by Bill Mueller, which is why I suggested him. That the original intent of the Teron CX design (not the other Teron models) was as an evaluation platform for Mai's chips isn't all that relevant today.
Eyetech don't commission/outsource any design either. Whenever Mai has a new version or revision of a board ready (first Teron CX "evaluation" version" -> "consumer" version, PX, Mini, I ...) , then this design is available for all customers/licensees, including but not exclusive to Eyetech.

That's not to say that customers like Eyetech have no influence on Mai's design decisions, of course Mai aren't deaf to input and requests from the market.

Yup, there's always the presentation skills bit. This is the job of salesmen, so they tend to beat others, *especially* engineers unfortunately, in that field... Then again, I think a "well performed" presentation filled with inaccuracies and cluelessness can be at least as irritating as a "poorly done" presentation from someone who knows their stuff. I do however think that almost anyone would be capable of answering questions about their product over the phone, if that's all that's expected of them.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 24 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Seehund on 04-Apr-2004 12:11 GMT
In reply to Comment 14 (Sammy Nordström):
I asked him about the Teron I, if Eyetech are planning on offering these to the "AmigaOne" market. The answer I was "looking for" was whether or not Eyetech are planning on selling Teron Is, nothing else.
I had no interest in entering a pointless argument about "you-know-what" (the licencing screwup is AInc's/KMOS's thing to undo) or trying to embarrass the guest speaker by asking any of the uncomfortable questions that I could have asked, wasting his and the audience's time, and I hope you're pretty alone in feeling that a question about possible future products is provocative. Personally I think that a PPC970 "AmigaOne" at the right price could be interesting, and I would think I would share that interest with most of the present audience. If he couldn't say, didn't know or didn't have anything planned, the usual response of "we're looking into that" would have sufficed.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 25 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 13:07 GMT
In reply to Comment 23 (Seehund):
"Mai haven't commissioned or outsourced the design of any of the currently available boards, they're designed in-house, mainly by Bill Mueller, which is why I suggested him. That the original intent of the Teron CX design (not the other Teron models) was as an evaluation platform for Mai's chips isn't all that relevant today.
Eyetech don't commission/outsource any design either. "

Listen carefully to the GBG interview with Alan from yesterday, ignoring his unwise comments about the April chip.

There is absolutely no reason why MAI should get involved in repeated iterations of design of a commercial motherboard. They are a design company, not a motherboard designing, manufacturing or selling company.

My information is that MAI do not do motherboard design in house - not that it matters much. I suggest you mail Bill Mueller to check your information.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 26 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 13:15 GMT
In reply to Comment 24 (Seehund):
"I asked him about the Teron I, if Eyetech are planning on offering these to the "AmigaOne" market. The answer I was "looking for" was whether or not Eyetech are planning on selling Teron Is, nothing else."

Had you asked "Will you be selling a board with a 970 CPU?" you might have got a more reasoned answer. You know very well that you keep on calling the AmigaOne "Teron" to annoy people. There is no warehouse full of "Teron" boards from which Eyetech buys stocks. The Amiga boards are designed and manufactured for Eyetech, using MAI's reference designs as a starting point.

I think you have misunderstood the whole business plan for the Eyetech/Hyperion products from the start. Perhaps you were misled by fleecy moss.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 27 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by smithy on 04-Apr-2004 13:46 GMT
In reply to Comment 26 (Don Cox):
>Had you asked "Will you be selling a board with a 970 CPU?" you might have got
>a more reasoned answer.

Seems like splitting straws. I don't understand why everyone is so keen to hide the Teron connection. Everyone knows that the "AmigaOne" is not custom designed hardware, like the Commodore Amigas and Pegasos are, so why do people get so jumpy whenever anyone mentions Teron?

Seehund's question sounded straightforward to me - he'd heard about a new Teron motherboard, and wondered if it'd be sold as an AmigaOne in the future. It seems back-to-front to ask if there would be the same board, but describe it by its specs instead of its name, as you suggest.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 28 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Sammy Nordström on 04-Apr-2004 14:03 GMT
In reply to Comment 24 (Seehund):
That's when he exlplained to you that the Teron design is merely an implementation of MAI's chipset, ie an evaluation board, rather than a reference design for the AmigaOne. Surely you must see why it's provocotive to constantly refer to the AmigaOne as a "Teron". You got the answer you deserved, IMO.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 29 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 14:29 GMT
In reply to Comment 27 (smithy):
"Seehund's question sounded straightforward to me - he'd heard about a new Teron motherboard, and wondered if it'd be sold as an AmigaOne in the future. It seems back-to-front to ask if there would be the same board, but describe it by its specs instead of its name, as you suggest."

The question was asked after Alan had explained the design processes involved in making a Micro-A1 that would be commercially viable. It should have been obvious that Eyetech have no plans to sell Teron boards. The Teron boards are aimed at a completely different market - board designers.

The implication of calling Eyetech's products "Teron" is that Alan has done no work at all but simply ordered hardware from a catalogue for resale. This is not the case.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 30 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 15:04 GMT
In reply to Comment 26 (Don Cox):
> The Amiga boards are designed and manufactured for Eyetech, using MAI's reference designs as a starting point.

Good for you to have such a vivid imagination ;) However, the boards are of course neither designed nor manufactured in Eyetech's famous fab. They are "produced" by Eyetech in the sense that a movie is by its producer: Eyetech coughs up the dough for the designs and production and lets smart people do the rest. As to the artistic input Eyetech has on designs, that remains to be seen. If MAI is grasping for straws or sees Eyetech as a model customer, who knows? Does all this matter at all? Not at this moment but the setup is a bit fragile. By comparison, the three man operation at bplan is a lot more robust: Northbridge does't work? Heck, let's use a different model. Four months later they have new boards. Eythech's dependency on MAI's designers and an Asian manufacturer doesn't give them the same flexibility. Btw, Eyetech's boards have stickers developed, designed and manufactured by Eyetech.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 31 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 15:26 GMT
In reply to Comment 30 (Anonymous):
"However, the boards are of course neither designed nor manufactured in Eyetech's famous fab. They are "produced" by Eyetech in the sense that a movie is by its producer: Eyetech coughs up the dough for the designs and production and lets smart people do the rest."

Nobody said the design or manufacture was done by Eyetech. Both are contracted out. However, Alan has to find out what specifications will be saleable - a board designer sitting in front of his CAD package can't do that. This is also the job BBRV do for Genesi - again, nobody suggests that they do the design or solder the chips themselves. BBRV cough up the dough for the design and production and let smart people do the rest.

The starting point for a board design must be a reference design or circuit, if one is available. If the chip designers suggest a certain layout, it would be rash to begin with something totally different.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 32 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by itix on 04-Apr-2004 15:30 GMT
In reply to Comment 29 (Don Cox):
"The Teron boards are aimed at a completely different market - board designers." Not completely. MAI Logic designed customer priced version from Teron CX with upgraded specs.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 33 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Seehund on 04-Apr-2004 16:13 GMT
In reply to Comment 25 (Don Cox):
> Listen carefully to the GBG interview with Alan from yesterday, ignoring his
> unwise comments about the April chip.

I did, and he does seem to have severe troubles being straightforward on what should be a non-issue.

Paraphrasing from memory: "Mai is a fabless chip designer". Well duh, of course they are, and that doesn't contradict that they obviously also design motherboards.

"The 'AmigaOnes' aren't Terons, because the hardware is different." No it's not. Any design so far, regardless of revisions and enhancements, that's available to Eyetech from Mai is also available to everybody else. When Mai incorporated e.g. the VIA686B in the Teron CX design instead of 686A, then this revised Teron CX design was of course available to anyone who made/sold Teron CX boards, including Eyetech.

> There is absolutely no reason why MAI should get involved in repeated
> iterations of design of a commercial motherboard.

Reasons notwithstanding, that's what they're doing. But of course there are reasons. Designing motherboards (which in this case is nothing groundbreaking or innovative, it's mainly a question of making their northbridge fit in there somewhere) isn't very taxing on company resources, and since there are customers who don't implement Articia applications on their own but could still be indirect Articia customers, like Eyetech, then why the heck not? Money is money, and Mai get to sell their chips as well as some licencing money for the chip applications (the Teron designs).

> My information is that MAI do not do motherboard design in house - not that it
> matters much. I suggest you mail Bill Mueller to check your information.

It was by e-mailing him that I learned of Mai's inhouse design to begin with.

> Had you asked "Will you be selling a board with a 970 CPU?" you might have got
> a more reasoned answer.

But I was interested in this specific mobo, and I also asked him if he knew any more details (than what's already said in the rather empty Mai press release) about the Teron I, since he's in touch with Mai so often and is already selling current Terons. An affirmative reply to your question would of course lead to a followup question: "Which board?" (That's if I even would have gotten the opportunity to ask two questions.) Rather roundabout way to get a reasoned answer to a very simple question.

> You know very well that you keep on calling the AmigaOne "Teron" to annoy
> people.

I call the Teron "Teron" because that's what it is and it's less confusing than trying to keep up with additional sets of labels (that keep changing) from third parties. Teron is not a derogatory term, you know. If some people are having a hard time to cope with reality and won't accept something that's GOOD, and instead wish that there should be "Amiga" hardware that's made "special" for no other reason than to be "special" (and thus even more expensive, more slowly developed, made in lower volumes, et c.), then I see no reason for anyone to play along in their charades just to please a confused minority. Likewise I wouldn't stop calling Pegasoses "Pegasoses" or PowerMacs "Power Macs" if anyone would get a licence to sell these to AmigaOS users. I also call AltiVec "AltiVec" instead of "Velocity Engine", and so on.

Personally, I find total bullshit like "The AmigaOne SE is not a Teron CX" to be infinitely more annoying.

> There is no warehouse full of "Teron" boards from which Eyetech buys stocks.

Of course not. (Well, at least there's no stock of PXs and Minis.) But nobody said that there is. BTW, if that was the case it would be a GOOD thing, don't you think?

> The Amiga boards are designed and manufactured for Eyetech, using MAI's
> reference designs as a starting point.

Amiga boards were designed and manufactured by Commodore and Quikpak, IIRC.

No, the boards sold by Eyetech are designed by Mai for anyone who's interested in selling Terons, including Mai mainly for evaluation/dev kit purposes. Which specific assembly plant it is that Eyetech or others commission for their manufacturing is even less interesting (unless that company is (in)famous for manufacturing stuff of particularly good or bad quality, or whatever else that could be relevant to us customers).
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 34 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 17:12 GMT
In reply to Comment 33 (Seehund):
"I did, and he does seem to have severe troubles being straightforward on what should be a non-issue."

It all seemed completely straightforward to me. You only find it confusing because what he said contradicts your theories.

I prefer to get the information from somebody who is directly involved. If Alan says in plain words that they pay the makers in Taiwan for the boards, and not MAI, you still insist that they are buying them from MAI.


IIRC this all started because you wanted a cheap AmigaOS that you could run on cheap hardware. It does look as though the new Amiga Forever will be exactly what you want. I will certainly buy a copy myself.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 35 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Kronos on 04-Apr-2004 17:47 GMT
In reply to Comment 34 (Don Cox):
> I prefer to get the information from somebody who is directly involved. If Alan says in
> plain words that they pay the makers in Taiwan for the boards, and not MAI, you still
> insist that they are buying them from MAI.

Which doesn't contradict what Seehund said ......

Difference between orginal TeronCX and A1-SE:
Different SB, but pin-compatible, no design change.
Different BIOS. no design change (we are talking bout HW, aren't we ?).
Slightly different behaviour when both AGP and 1st PCI are used, probraly just a few jumpers.
2 wires as an hotfix for the worst Articia-bug, hardly a design change.

Difference between latest TeronCX and A1-SE:
None (except maybe a few ROM-extensions).

Difference between orginal TeronPX and A1-XE:
dunno bout SB and BIOS, if so see above.
Newer stepping of the NB, no design change.
Non-functioning audio onboard, minor design change.

Difference between latest TeronPX and A1-XE:
None (see above).

What Eyetech is doing is just like that:
Company xy buys a licence from Genesi for the Peg-design.
Company xy finds a fab to produce the board, or just uses the one that Genesi uses (DCE).
Company xy buys parts, or gives fab-owner money to buy parts.

Company xy sells boards as Centaurus-G4.

Did company xy design the Centaurus ? Or commisionecd the design ? No, just like Eyetech
had no major impact on the designs of the Terons/A1s.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 36 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 04-Apr-2004 17:56 GMT
In reply to Comment 35 (Kronos):
Do you actually have copies of all these boards?

If so, why?
If not, how do you make these comparisons?

However, I was talking about the design process that is going on now, for the "Micro" A1.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 37 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 18:30 GMT
In reply to Comment 31 (Don Cox):
> Nobody said the design or manufacture was done by Eyetech

I'm terribly sorry, I misread your comment "The Amiga boards are designed and manufactured for Eyetech".
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 38 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by itix on 04-Apr-2004 18:43 GMT
In reply to Comment 36 (Don Cox):
http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=2280 But if you look carefully they do not look 1:1 same. (http://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2003/debian-powerpc-200301/msg00466.html) There is also Teron Mini: http://www.inguard.com/release/HYT-016-D.htmHowever there arent Teron Mini resellers.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 39 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Seehund on 04-Apr-2004 19:44 GMT
In reply to Comment 34 (Don Cox):
> If Alan says in plain words that they pay the makers in Taiwan for the boards,
> and not MAI, you still insist that they are buying them from MAI.

No. I don't say that they buy the physical boards from Mai. Whatever difference that would make. Sorry if I've been unclear.

I say that they licence the Teron designs from Mai, and then commission the manufacturing of these boards to whatever manufacturer they've chosen (it would probably be easiest and make the best economical sense if this is the same manufacturer that already makes the same boards for Mai's dev kit programme, Inguard and whoever else). Alan says the same, albeit in a pretty roundabout and evasive way, as if it would be something to be ashamed of, which I don't think it is.

These details about exactly where Eyetech or anybody else get Terons from aren't terribly interesting IMO. A board sold as an "AmigaOne" is a Teron, plus an "AmigaOne by Eyetech" sticker. That sticker comprises the physical "differences" between Terons sold by Eyetech and Terons sold by anybody else. Intangible differences include stuff like a serial number or code added to the firmware - the "dongle" - (has anyone gotten around to actually add that code yet?) and a jacked up price.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 40 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 21:16 GMT
In reply to Comment 8 (Anonymous):
>runs "concurrently", on any system, it's either CPU or DMA. SD-RAM just is not
>dual-ported RAM. I don't know if I misunderstood due to bad audio quality but
>some other technical statements by Alan were equally confused/confusing. For
>example, he alternately described the April as "dongle" and "fix" and, in the
>context of DMA problems under Linux blamed endianess?! But again, I might just
>have misunderstood, the audio quality of that part made it difficult for me to
>understand him.

Remember that there are more buses than the CPU and the RAM in a system.
You have 1 PCI interface, 1 AGP interface, 1 SB interface 1 RAM interface etc.
So while the CPU is reading data from the GFX board, the Artica may be dma'ing
data from the SDRAM to the SB interface. There is the concurent operation.
This is also why there is a cache coherency issue on the artica since the CPU
won't be able to snoop the dma operation if the CPU is busy using its bus for
other purposes. And here is where the April chip comes in. If I have understood
it correctly, the April chip will inhibit the concurent bus accesses to make
sure that the CPU is able to snoop on the DMA transfers when they take place.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 41 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Johan Rönnblom on 04-Apr-2004 21:43 GMT
I also never understood why Eyetech are being so touchy about
comparisons with the Terons. And I really don't understand Alan's
problem with this question.

Before, when there's been a new Teron model, we've seen an AmigaOne
model with near identical features at the same time. I don't care what
people want to call this process, but if again there is or will be a
new Teron model, it seems to me like a natural question whether this
one too will be followed by a new AmigaOne model. I really don't
understand why Alan couldn't just answer this simple question.

Come on, I don't trust the Articia and I am still convinced it has
fatal bugs, but apart from that, I hardly see any problem with this.
Better versions get released, what's the problem?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 42 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 04-Apr-2004 22:48 GMT
In reply to Comment 40 (Anonymous):
> If I have understood it correctly, the April chip will inhibit the concurent bus accesses memory

Thanks for the explanation but that does not seem to be a performance issue? If I understand you correctly, April would only make the system slower if source and target of the CPU-driven process and source and target of the DMA-driven process are different: you would have to have four different end points (and one of them has to be the CPU). In that case it would theoretically be possible to run the two streams physically at the same time, concurrently, instead of multiplexing the streams in the bus protocols? The relevant, noticable advantage of DMA - normal mode of operation - is that memory transfers proceed without the CPU, so that the CPU is free to execute the program (much of it in the cache). That advantage is not affected by April. Of the remaining interesting scenarios, most involve memory accesses on both sides, eg. CPU accesses memory, DMA fills memory. Those can not by concurrent anyway with single-ported ram. The only semi-interesting scenario left seems to be the one you mentioned: graphics card accessed by the CPU with ongoing DMA. In that scenario, if you are correct, the April chip would have to resort to multiplexing accesses. Who is affected? Probably people who scroll madly with ongoing DMA. Effect on performance, wild guess: a fraction of a percent of typical uptime?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 43 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 05-Apr-2004 04:59 GMT
In reply to Comment 41 (Johan Rönnblom):
Because he is not selling Terons, he is selling "Amigas". ;)
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 44 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Hans-Joerg Frieden on 05-Apr-2004 06:51 GMT
In reply to Comment 33 (Seehund):
> Personally, I find total bullshit like "The AmigaOne SE is not a Teron CX" to
> be infinitely more annoying.

Maybe you're right, but it goes the other way, too - some people find your insistance on "Teron" instead of "AmigaOne" equally annoying. A good idea might be to meet in the middle, don't you think?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 45 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by norwegian blue? red? dead. on 05-Apr-2004 07:45 GMT
In reply to Comment 44 (Hans-Joerg Frieden):
You know that a platform has no hope in hell when even developers wanna play alternate reality games, in addition to the usual clueless fanbois.

Maybe you're right, but it goes the other way, too - some people find your insistance on "Teron" instead of "AmigaOne" equally annoying. A good idea might be to meet in the middle, don't you think?

Yeah, what I find annoying is some people's insistance on calling the color red "red." I and some friends of mine have decided to call this visible light of the wavelength 650 nm "blue" instead. Please stop annoying us. Can't we meet in the middle and decide to call it "green"?

AAARRRRGH! THE IDIOCY! FREAKS! Get me outta here! Dear Linux, forgive me for my thought of straying from you. I'll take the occasional goatse link on slashduh any day over this.
You people make we wanna crawl up in a fetal position in my warm and cozy server room and forget about humanity, when it hosts specimens like some seen here. Sorry Seehund, Johann and the few others with a clue, sanity has no place here. Stop annoying these good people, you might disturb them in their sleep.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 46 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Sammy Nordström on 05-Apr-2004 07:50 GMT
In reply to Comment 45 (norwegian blue? red? dead.):
Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 47 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Tatu on 05-Apr-2004 09:02 GMT
I have to aggree. I think there is some guys here who use word Teron just to annoy people. Those guys don't seem to understand that even if AmigaOne is almost or fully same hardware as Teron, then Eyetech and others do not need to like it if you call their product as Teron.

Don't you guys understand that there is lot's of IT companies who lisence a board/hardware design, give it a new name suitable for their market, and then sell it to their own group of customers ? That's normal these days.

Do you really think that all components in your PC is originally designed by the company whos name/logo/component name is printed to that component ? If you think like that then you really don't know what you are talking about.

Companies buy designs from eachother. When you do so it's normal that you can use that design to build your own product around it. And it's normal that you can give your own name to it. If company has right to give product a new name, they do not need to like it if you insist that it's called like the original design. Try to say somethinmg like that to any mainstream company which has lisenced a design from some other company.. You can be sure that they do not like you.

AND you guys really do not know how much Eyetech has participated to designing of AmigaOne. You don't know how much Eyetech guys have worked to make original teron boards suitable for Amiga use. If you look at the first photos of the MAI teron and lates photos, then you sure see that it is not the same board. How do you know that Eyetech has not done lot's of work with MAI to make that board better than what it was ?

I think Eyetech has every damn right to call it AmigaOne, and they do not need to like it if you call it Teron. As long as it's sold to this market they can call it Amigaone if they want to.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 48 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Anonymous on 05-Apr-2004 10:21 GMT
In reply to Comment 44 (Hans-Joerg Frieden):
> some people find your insistance on "Teron" instead of "AmigaOne" equally annoying. A good idea might be to meet in the middle, don't you think?

Very constructive but: If you say Teron and the effect is that people explode with a blue face, that is so much more funny. We are truly lucky that Eyetech didn't just label the boards AmigaOne/Teron. No - they understand comedy and attach Eytech quality assurance stickers to every free surface and do the I'm Upset routine at Q&A sessions. Go Eytech, go! Meeting in the middle idea: Teromiga? MiggyTeron? *ducks & grabs beer* Diclaimer: Scaracastic and ironic, don't take seriously.
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 49 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Johan Rönnblom on 05-Apr-2004 11:01 GMT
I think a big part of the problem here is Eyetech's inability to
explain exactly what their position is in this. Personally, I've no
idea whether I should say that they have an OEM agreement with MAI, or
with someone else, or if they licensed the design, or if they licensed
the board, or what they really did and what the AmigaOne's "official"
relation to the Terons is supposed to be.

Maybe someone here could help me and tell me how Seehund could have
asked his question without upsetting poor Alan?
Amigbg 2004 quick report : Comment 50 of 92ANN.lu
Posted by Don Cox on 05-Apr-2004 11:20 GMT
In reply to Comment 49 (Johan Rönnblom):
"Maybe someone here could help me and tell me how Seehund could have
asked his question without upsetting poor Alan?"

He could have said "Do you think there is a market for a motherboard with a 970 processor?"

After all, that is what we are interested to know - is a G5 Amiga likely in the forseeable future? Not the details of who pays the guy who lays out the tracks on the board.
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